Wednesday, November 13, 2013

Author Kat Sheridan and Richard Castle



I’m delighted to welcome author Kat Sheridan here today. I recently became acquainted with her and her new Victorian gothic romance novel, ECHOES IN STONE

Here’s a brief description of the intriguing novel:

A letter from the grave…
       Lily is dead. But a mysterious letter launches her half-sister, Jessa Palmer, on a harrowing journey into the wilds of Cornwall to rescue Lily’s daughter from a tyrant of a father, a man who confessed to murder. Jessa follows in Lily’s footsteps to a forbidding castle on the cliffs, but discovers the past will not stay dead at Tremayne Hall. Someone—or something—wants to ensure Jessa is no more successful at escaping than was Lily.

A heart locked in stone…
       Bitter, brooding, and tragically scarred, Viscount Dashiell Tremayne believes Jessa is just like her manipulative, unfaithful half-sister. He’s not about to let another treacherous woman into his home or into his heart. Particularly not a woman who’s come to steal his daughter. Only one can win in the battle for a child’s life. Then the accidents begin.

A passion that threatens to consume them…
       Jessa wants only to take her niece and escape the grim manor. But Dash, fiercely protective of those he loves, gives up nothing that belongs to him. As the danger escalates, so does the heat between Jessa and Dash. Soon she’ll have to make a choice: surrender the child to a man she cannot trust or surrender her heart to the same fires of passion that destroyed Lily.

Oh, my … now that sounds fascinating! Well, I’ve also learned that Kat is a fan of one of my favorite TV shows, Castle. She’s joining us now to talk about … ‘Richard Castle is (sadly!) not real.

One of my favorite television shows is Castle. For those who haven’t seen it, the premise is that a famous mystery novelist connects with a group of New York police detectives and follows them around gathering plot ideas for his novels while solving crimes. In between, he lives a lavish lifestyle in a scrupulously clean apartment, attends fancy cocktail parties, and smiles charmingly through standing room only book signings.

It’s a nice fantasy (and seriously, who doesn’t just love to look at Nathan Fillion, who plays Richard Castle?). But it’s nothing remotely resembling the real life of any author I know. Sure, there might be a few like that. If you believe everything you read on Facebook, any number of authors are jetting off on research trips to Europe, riding camels in Tibet, or rafting down the Nile River or something. 

But most of us? All we really want is at least one room in the house that doesn’t have a dust bunnies forming a union to protest for better living conditions, one load of laundry that gets washed and dried and folded and put away, and maybe one dinner a week that’s been cooked in an actual pan on an actual stove and made with actual ingredients that don’t come from a can. A shower now and then would be a bonus.

KatSheridan_EchoesInStone_200pxI know lots of heroic writers who hold down full time jobs, manage the entire household, raise kids, entertain friends, coach little league, and still manage to turn out multiple books a year. I don’t know how they do it. I admire them more than I can say. I want to get them into a quiet corner and ferret out their secret. Because I? Am clueless.

When the muse is upon me and the characters are demanding my attention like a two-year-old on a cotton-candy-and-Kool-Aid-sugar-fueled high, I consider myself fortunate to even find a clean coffee cup, much less run out and solve crimes and make a gourmet dinner at the end of the day. At times like this, when I finally back away from the keyboard (which is more like wriggling out of handcuffs), I am grateful for a hubs that likes take-out Chinese food and doesn’t mind that the “cocktail hour” consists of box wine drunk from a souvenir glass that says “Surrender the Booty!” on the side.

It would be nice to be Richard Castle, but here’s the important thing to remember. He’s a figment of somebody’s imagination, a dream of what a writer could be. But I’m the real thing. A writer (albeit a messy, clueless one!), but still, a real writer.

If you’re a writer, did you ever fantasize about what the writing life would be like? And if you’re not a writer, do you ever picture what your favorite author is actually doing all day? (Hint: it’s less likely to include bon-bons and more likely to include litter boxes.)

Kat, thanks so much for joining us today. I have to admit, I’m one of those readers who use to think a writer’s life was much more glamorous than it probably is. Having met writers through blogging, I still put y’all on pedestals, but now it’s for all the hard work y’all do so we readers can live happily in any kind of dream world we’d like. And yes, looking at Castle is fun.

Now if you’re not familiar with Kat, let me tell you a bit about her.

Kat is a former project manager whose very serious exterior hides a secret romantic. She is fond of books, bourbon, big words, coffee, and shiny things. Kat splits her time between the Midwest in the summer and the South in the winter, sharing her home with the love of her life and an exceedingly dignified Shih Tzu. 

She loves to hear from readers, and can be contacted at www.KatSheridan.com.

ECHOES IN STONE can be found at Amazon (print and Kindle), Barnes and Noble (print and Nook), Kobo (e-book only), and Smashwords ( e-book, most popular formats).

Thanks everyone for stopping by today. I’m curious like Kat, did you ever fantasize about what the writing life would be like? (*Thanks Sia Smile)

12 comments:

  1. Kat, thanks again for visiting today. I'm in awe of all the hard work you writers go through. While some things may be easier in the publishing world these days, I'd say it's probably harder too considering that writers have to do more promoting now. Wishing you much success.

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  2. Good morning, Mason, and thank you for having mer here today! So many writers, including me, are such introverts, and promotion is indeed the hardest part. That's why we're always so happy to find blogs like yours, with so many nice folks. Making new friends has been the best part of promotion!

    As for fantasizing about the writing life (and what a good question!), I used to do that before I became a writer. I grew up watching shows like Murder, She Wrote, about another crime-solving novelist. It looked so idyllic--ride a bike around a charming town, visit with friends, solve a crime, type out a few pages here and there.....BWAHAHAHA!! NOTHING like that! There's a lot of butt-in-chair time, and if somebody rang my doorbell and wanted to stop by for a chat and tea while I'm in the middle of a scene, there wouldn't be any mystery as to who killed who!

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  3. Mason - Thanks for hosting Kat.

    Kat - Thanks for sharing your story and your Castle connection. It is fun to dream about what a 'big-time' writer's life is like. But as for me, I'm content with my own home office. What I do dream about is more time to write. That would be wonderful... I wish you success!

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    1. Hi, Margot, and thank you! And yes, time, that bane of every writer's life! I always feel like Scotty in Star Trek: "I need more time, Captain!" (you just read that in a Scottish voice, right? LOL!) I live in two places, depending on the time of year, but don't really have my own office space (yet--we're working on it). I make do with the kitchen table in one house, and have taken over the dining room space in the other. But some day....!

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  4. Richard Castle isn't real?!? I'm so disillusioned.

    Lovely interview. Thanks.

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    1. I wish he was, too, LD. And it really gets weird and meta when you can go to Amazon and buy the Niki Heat books! I can't help by hear Nathan Fillion's voice when I read one of them!

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  6. Okay, trying this again under my own name as my computer thinks i'm my boyfriend David... I fantasize about having time to write that's not squeezed in between my day job and cleaning out cat boxes. I know, I'm such a dreamer... But Kat, you are SO right about the totally misguided perceptions so many people have about the life of published writers... at least most of us!

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    1. Dana, glad to see you here! And since I can guess how very MANY cat boxes you have, that could seriously cut down on your time (Dana rescuses cats and has a LOT of them! All of them cuties!) Thank goodness for one thing we DO have in common with fictional writers--wine!

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  7. Ha! I'm still trying to live my writer fantasy. I'm not even close to how I imagined it would be. Living in a mansion on cliff overlooking the ocean? Nope! Huge office/library with built in book cases full of leather bound tomes? Nope! A maid? Still nope. I lost the day job, finally, but the muse is still a fickle beast. I don't write much more than I did with a day job. I do sometimes wear pajama pants all day. It's the little things that make this job so grand.

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    1. Ah, but you do have an ocean view, Olivia, instead of cornfields, so that's a step in the right direction! And yes, YAY for pajama pants!

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  8. Well, I never pictured bon-bons or hunky pool boys and god forbid solving crimes and writing too. Lol! Truthfully, I can't say I have a real vision of being an author beyond having time to actually write and not trying to carve out time, dead tired, between a job and a list of things to do.

    My illusion was writing stories and have them published and getting paid for it. There were a few booksignings, a few conferences, research trips, and a housekeeper? Is that too much to ask?

    However, I have too many friends who are published authors and as a result I lost my rose colored glasses many years ago. :-)

    Sia McKye Over Coffee

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I'd love to hear your thoughts on today's post. Thanks for dropping by.